


The BAU in the Bone Yard

by Whiitewolf



Category: Bones (TV), Criminal Minds (US TV)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:00:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,275
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26332297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whiitewolf/pseuds/Whiitewolf
Summary: Ten bodies are discovered, and Temperance Brennan and her team are called in to identify the remains while the BAU tries to track down the serial killer who is holding another woman. Can these two teams work together to save the woman's life before the clock runs out?
Comments: 6
Kudos: 31





	The BAU in the Bone Yard

**Author's Note:**

> Any feedback is so much appreciated! Thank you!

A frustrated sob escaped her dry, cracked lips as she pulled at her ropes. Ashley desperately tried to ignore the pain in her wrists as the thick, rough ropes continually dug deeper into her skin due to her struggles. Her hands felt cold, and were starting to grow numb. She could see that girl beside her remained still. She seemed to have been knocked out cold. The girl mirrored her own appearance shockingly closely. She had the same long blonde hair, well past her shoulders. She had the same slim, athletic figure. She had the same shade of pale skin, which must need constant sunscreen on sunny days, to avoid looking like a lobster. Ashley had been as red as a lobster more than a few times, after days as bright as the one she'd been out in, when this started.

She recalled what had happened, in a panic. He hadn't blindfolded her. Ashley had seen his face. Every cop show on TV gave the same answer for what that meant… He didn't intend to let her live. He'd stopped her on her way to work at the elementary school and asked her for directions. The fact that she found him visually appealing had been a big part in her reasons to stopped to talk to him. It was one of the reasons she had felt safe engaging in a conversation with him. His brown eyes had been filled with warmth and had made her feel at ease. His height had him towering over her, which might have been intimidating to many people, but she'd always liked tall guys.

_Breathe in. Breathe out._ She tried to calm herself. She tried to focus on counting. Panicking would not solve the problem, but it was so much easier to tell yourself not to panic than to actually do it. Ashley noticed that the other girl was stirring. Her eyes flicked open and darted around the room, reminding Ashley of an animal stuck in a cage. Not that that was too far off from the truth.

Both of them sat on the cold, dirt floor of the basement. The only light in the room came from a small, dirty window. It shone right on the two girls, both tied with their backs to metal posts that held up the ceiling, their arms behind the posts. Their feet were bound to rings in the floor that were shockingly secure. They could barely even see the walls, but it was clear the room was fairly large. There was little decoration, just an ugly fabric couch in the corner.

"Hi," Ashley said quietly, her voice shaking. It took everything to fight against every urge she had to scream for help. "I know you're scared, but we have to remain calm." Ashley had wondered earlier why he hadn't bothered to gag them, then quickly blocked off the thought to avoid letting it set her off into a greater panic. The possibility that no one could hear them, even if they screamed, was not one she wanted to consider.

"What's your name?" Ashley asked, attempting to make her voice calm, despite the frantic pounding of her heart. The strangeness of this situation almost made her want to laugh. There they were, captives whose lives were clearly in danger, and she was making some pathetic attempt at small talk. It felt like the best way to keep the girl from panicking and gaining his attention.

"D-d-Dakota," the other girl answered.

"I'm Ashley," she responded. She mustered up enough energy to give Dakota a small smile. "We need to get out of here. Try and get your ropes off.

"I'll try," Dakota whispered, and Ashley saw the girl's eyes narrow and her features twist in a way that gave the impression she was concentrating. Watching Dakota made Ashley feel a surge of motivation to try again as well. Even stuck in such a terrible situation, neither of them had given up yet.

They didn't speak much for the next while. Occasionally, they'd ask how the other was doing, but other than that, it was mostly quiet. They could both hear the TV upstairs, and neither of them vocalized their fear. The worry that he would come down here, and stop them from progressing. Every time they heard a shift of movement, they both froze. They each knew the other was thinking about him, but each tried to put up a brave front to help the other stay strong.

After a while, Ashley began to cry softly. It seemed like she'd been working at this for hours. She'd feel like she was making progress, only to realize she'd gotten nowhere in her attempts at escape. Ashley felt hopeless, and the reality was setting in that these might be the last awful moments of her life. That they probably were.

"I almost have it!" Dakota said with a sudden gasp of delight, and the hope in her voice was contagious. Despite the damp chill of the basement, Ashley felt a surge of warmth through her body. The frantic beating of her heart steadied slightly.

Though she shouldn't have done it, Ashley abandoned her own attempt, and watched Dakota carefully. The moment the rope fell to the floor, Ashley's heart felt like it had skipped a beat. Ashley let out her breath loudly, realizing she had been unconsciously holding it. It took mere seconds for Dakota to untie her feet as well, but time had frozen. Ashley was overly aware of each beat of her heart. And every breath she took seemed too loud.

"Hang on," Dakota said. Ashley could see that Dakota had been crying, but she'd stopped now. By the time she finally got over to Ashley and carefully undid her bonds, Ashley had stopped as well. They hadn't escaped yet, but the relief was overwhelming. There was a slight ache where Ashley's wrists had been tied so tightly, and there was a tingling sensation in her hands and feet as her circulation began to work properly again.

The second her arms and legs were free, Ashley reached to embrace Dakota. Getting up so suddenly, she felt a wave of dizziness and got a painful reminder of where he'd struck her on the head. The fact that they were strangers didn't matter. They were scared, with only each other, desperately not wanting to be alone.

The single small window was too high for them to reach it, but they quickly realized the dusty old couch in the corner was their way up. They were forced to use all their strength to lift it to avoid it scraping the floor. It was slower, but that was needed in order to maintain the silence. If he heard them, all their work might mean nothing.

"You're smaller," Dakota told Ashley in a hurried whisper when they'd finally positioned the couch below the window. "I'll help you up, then you help pull me through."

Luckily for them, the latch on the window was easy to undo. As Dakota intertwined her hands for Ashley use as a step, Ashley noticed that the place had grown quieter. Sometime in the past few minutes, the television had been turned off. The echoing of footsteps above them seemed amazingly loud, like man above them had become a giant. Ashley froze, her breath caught in her throat.

Dakota didn't falter. "Go!" she urged Ashley. And Ashley went. It took all her strength to squeeze herself through the little window, but she pushed harder than she thought she ever had before, in her entire life. Ashley could hear the floorboards of the staircase groan under his weight as he came down towards the basement. She knew it was only a matter of seconds before he opened the door.

Ashley got through the window and turned quickly. She threw herself to the ground so she could reach down through the window, to pull Dakota up behind her. The door swung open violently and slammed against the wall. She heard the inhuman snarl that he let out. It was difficult to see into the basement, but Ashley could swear that she could see a fiery rage in his eyes now. She couldn't believe she'd ever thought them to be warm.

The towering man ran towards them. Ashley reached for Dakota, but so did he. Ashley was not fast enough, and once the man grabbed Dakota, he had no trouble pulling her from Ashley's grasp.

Ashley wanted to help her, with every fibre of her being. But as she reached desperately for Dakota's outstretched hands, their eyes met. "I'm sorry," Ashley cried out. It was useless. Her apology wouldn't matter to Dakota. It wouldn't make up for the fact she was leaving Dakota to suffer whatever cruelty the man had planned. Everything in Ashley told her to stop and save Dakota, but Ashley's body wasn't listening.

She was running. The aches in her legs, feet and arms from being tied up and exhausted didn't matter. The starvation and desperate thirst she felt didn't matter. None of it mattered. Surviving mattered, and she wasn't stopping for anything, even though her body cried out to her to for rest. It looked like she was in the middle of nowhere. All she could see were huge, green trees. There were no signs of civilization. There was nothing but forest, until she reached a tall, barbed wire fence.

Ashley's heart fell as she saw the fence line. Her eyes scanned as quickly as possible for a way around or an opening, but she did not see one. She was going to have to climb the fence. She heard the distant sound of the house door slamming, and she knew that she didn't have much time.

* * *

Temperance Brennan tried not to sigh as she walked into her office. She had planned to spend the whole day in pleasant study, identifying older archaeological finds. But there was Seeley Booth, sitting on the couch in her office. This tended to mean he was about to try and pull her away from her important work on ancient remains to deal with FBI matters.

"Not today," Brennan said, a slight pleading whine entering her voice.

"A hiker stumbled upon some remains deep out in the forest," Booth said like he was reading from a report, ignoring her request. "When police went out to investigate, they found the bodies of ten different individuals."

Brennan tried to ignore him as she set her bag down. "They asked me to look at some old Egyptian remains, Booth."

"Okay," he said with a tone that suggested he was giving up, "But they're already at the crime scene and I heard that the person handling the bones doesn't seem to know what they're doing."

"Wait, they're touching _my_ bones?" Brennan asked incredulously, her eyes widening.

"Your bones? I thought Egyptians were calling out to you today." Booth faked an innocent smile, knowing that he had gotten her hooked onto his case. Brennan would cringe at the idea of someone she didn't know or respect dealing with human remains.

"That's ridiculous, Booth. Remains are incapable of calling out."

"Well, I know that Bones. What I meant was - Oh, never mind. Are you coming or not?"

Brennan gave a quick longing look at her bag, thinking about the remains that were already waiting for her downstairs. "Alright, I'm coming," she said with a huff, reaching to snatch up her bag.

* * *

"How many bodies?" Morgan asked, picking up the file as he sat down at the round table. He felt a bit shocked to note how empty the file was.

"They've found ten so far," Garcia said, attempting to keep a neutral tone, clicking the remote to show pictures that had already been sent over from the site where the remains had been found. "Our people are still at the dump site. They've called in a expert to help identify the remains. But our main priority is this." She clicked again to show a picture of a young woman, who appeared to be no more than twenty five years old. "Ashley Morrison went missing yesterday," Penelope continued, "With the discovery of this new site, they have asked us to go see if her disappearance is related."

JJ winced slightly, feeling a pang of empathy for the young blonde looking at her on the screen.

"Where is this site?" Emily asked, flipping through the limited information she had about Ashley's disappearance.

"The Shenandoah Valley Region," Hotch answered calmly, now getting to his feet. "We can take two vehicles over. It's about two hours away."

"Who's the expert?" Rossi asked curiously.

"Doctor Temperance Brennan," Garcia said. "She's a renowned forensic anthropologist who frequently helps in FBI cases involving extremely damaged or decomposed human remains."

"Doctor Brennan?" Reid asked excitedly, his eyes lighting up, "I have all her books. Both her crime books and her research books. Did you know it was her and her team of scientists that identified and stopped the Gravedigger?" He told them quickly.

"That's the one that buried her victims for ransom money, right?" JJ asked. She recalled seeing the case come across her desk, and she felt a bit of guilt remembering that she had taken the team on a different case instead of that one.

"Yes! And if you didn't pay the ransom, the kidnap victims died," Spencer answered, "All of them until Doctor Temperance Brennan and Doctor Jack Hodgins were buried, and survived." Although the seriousness of the circumstances did not escape him, Reid could not help but be excited at the prospect of meeting someone he had idolized for years.


End file.
